We are especially motivated to strengthen the WGS program now in light of increases in misogynistic, racist, homophobic, transphobic, xenophobic, and Islamophobic rhetoric and policy that have emerged within state and national politics over the last few years. Examples include HB2, assaults on reproductive rights and women’s healthcare, the erosion of voting rights and increased efforts to prevent people from exercising the franchise, the growing prominence of various kinds of hate crimes, the threat of registries for Muslims, and the public normalization of sexual assault.

This is a time when intersectional feminist analysis and organizing is more vital than ever. The WGS Program is teaching our students how to understand and grapple with these contemporary realities while seeking to imagine and work toward possibilities for justice – as messy and complex as that process is. We provide necessary tools for understanding the relations among forms of oppression and for seeking to combat them.

We have been doing this work for almost half a century, and your help will enable us to continue and extend our efforts in these difficult times.

Increased teaching by cross-appointed faculty

New course creation

Research and travel grants for students and faculty

Assistantship funding to increase our MA program’s competitiveness

Events for prospective and current WGS students and faculty

“I plan to be a labor organizer when I graduate from UNCG. WGS was my first real introduction into critical analyses of oppression and liberation…WGS helped me to understand the most complex intricacies of the world around us, all through the scope of wanting to change it.”

“WGS has been instrumental in my personal, professional, and academic development. It has given me deep analytical skills, access to an array of disciplines, and it has empowered me not to simply welcome diversity, but to work intentionally towards understanding people who are different from me. WGS has completely changed the way I look at the world, for the better.”